Aug 2014 Oscar Academy script competition review of Dark Jungle. Nice to see the Academy recognize a horror film. Dark Jungle: The convention of Vietnam movies tends to focus heavily on the more psychological aspects of warfare, questions of morality and soldiers facing the dark night of the soul. And while this screenplay very much relies on what we are already familiar with in that genre, here the writer manages to use those same elements to tell a much more genre-defying supernatural horror story, winding up with something that feels wholly original in a sea of competition. At a tight 87 pages what might appear on the surface to be a quick and fairly straight-forward read about men on a mission is actually very densely layered, rich with visual imagery & detail, and evokes a strong sense of darker forces at play, long before the supernatural elements kick into high gear. And when they do, the twists and turns come thick and fast until the final showdown, which is violent, horrific and as tragic a testament to theme of war as purgatory that I have encountered. Though full of flashbacks, flash forwards, alternate timelines and surreal occurrences, the script is tightly focused and extremely well structured. Playing the story out exclusively from Johns perspective (a soldier with amnesia) justifies the structural trickery, and as the mystery unravels plays out to a satisfying, yet altogether tragic, conclusion. Supporting characters in the platoon feel slightly less nuanced, and mostly dealt with in archetypal form, but this does make sense in the overall construct of the story, and each character at least manages to stand apart so that they are individually identifiable other than in name only. This certainly wont be everyones cup of tea, the violence is frequent, graphic and brutal, the tone is as dark as the title suggests and there are no happy endings or moral take aways (other than war is literally hell) in sight. The ending too is somewhat overwhelming in its assault on the senses as revelations and supporting imagery are stitched together from the past, present and alternate timelines at frenetic pace. It does ultimately make sense though and fully pays off on a complicated setup, which will surely be greatly aided in the final visualization. End review. ------------------------- Dark Jungle is a 2013 ScreamfestLA script semifinalist. screamfestla/submissions/screenplay-awards-2013 ---------------------- Trailer for script. vimeo/m/48760099
Posted on: Mon, 29 Sep 2014 18:26:17 +0000
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